1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to electronic informational and commercial transactions and interactions, specifically, to facilitating such transactions and interactions through the use of computers and the Internet.
2. Description of Related Art
A. Related Art: The Need for a Universal Electronic Transaction System
Two of the most frequently used Internet and World Wide Web services are (I) electronic commerce services, particularly, the buying and selling of goods and services wherein a portion of the transaction is conducted via the World Wide Web, and (II) information search services, particularly, providing a customized list of websites and Web-accessible documents in response to an inquiry submitted by a user to a Web search engine, whereby an index of Web pages is searched. While effective technology for each of the aforementioned services exists, its usefulness is severely limited by a number of technical factors as follows.
B. Related Art: Internet Auction Systems
Under the related art, dynamically priced e-commerce transactions are offered to Web users through the use of dynamically generated web pages that incorporate data drawn from the auctioneer's databases. Current providers of such services include eBay, Amazon, and Yahoo. This approach is not ideal in that such “deep Web” data cannot be readily indexed and catalogued by external search engine providers; thus, searching Internet auctions for a particular item requires that a user visit each individual auction site and search through that given website's search interface or have an intermediary do so.
Moreover, auction site providers typically frown upon attempts to index, analyze, or otherwise make use of information in the auctioneer's databases for purposes other than bidding, and these website providers may use their control of the information therein to prevent competition by other companies. Thus, obtaining accurate and complete market data pertaining to Internet auctions is more difficult than it would be in a transparent marketplace.
If an Internet user does not wish to list his or her auctions on a major site and pay the fees charged by the given Internet auctioneer, a user can start his or her own auction site. This alternative is not ideal in that it involves a great deal of time and expense and offers a low chance of success: to launch a new Internet auction site, one must purchase (or write), install, run and maintain expensive auction site software on expensive computer hardware, incur all the other risks and expenses associated with starting a business, and then come up with a way to draw bidders and sellers away from the existing major companies' sites. Very few people are up to the task.
What is needed, therefore, is an Internet auction system and method that allows (I) any person with a web page (II) to host an Internet auction on that web page (III) without requiring this person to purchase any software (IV) while yet allowing the person's auction to be searchable through any Web search engine and (V) also allowing data from all such Internet auctions in the world to be easily and freely gathered, analyzed and disseminated by anyone who wishes to do so.
C. Related Art: Internet Search Systems and Methods
Web search engines under the related art allow users to input terms and operators of their own choosing. Current providers of search engines include Google, MSN, and Ask Jeeves. However, the search function itself is still conducted according to the particular algorithmic approach established by the service provider. Such a “paternalistic” approach presumes that computer engineers or business owners are better equipped to create a search algorithm than are the people doing the searching, e.g., users at large. These systems are not ideal in that such a one-size-fits-all service is unlikely to yield results that are better than—or even equal to—those that could be obtained through the use of individual algorithms that have been uniquely tailored to meet the individual needs of a particular person with a particular search inquiry at a particular point in time.
What is needed, therefore, is a mechanism that allows Internet users to select the search methodology used in a particular search term, to combine the results of a search under one methodology with another search under another methodology, to assign how much weight is allotted to each methodology, to set standards against which each indexed item (e.g., document or record) is measured, to set maximum levels or tolerances for variations from such standards, and to otherwise define the way a search is performed rather than be reliant upon an a priori definition set by someone else.
D. Related Art: Internet Classified Ad Systems
Dynamically priced transaction vehicles (e.g., auctions) are not the only type of Internet classified ad. Numerous websites devoted to a given type of classified ad—personal ads, real estate ads, job listing ads, vehicle ads, and others—have been developed to meet such demand. Current providers of such services include Craigslist, Zip Realty, and Matchmaker.com. Again, however, in order to allow user posting and editing of such classified ads, these sites also rely upon database-driven, dynamic web page generation. Thus, most of the limitations described above in reference to Internet auctions apply to these classified ad systems as well: indexing by third parties is difficult and may cause legal battles with website providers who believe that user-provided content is their property; compilation and analysis of such data is difficult.
What is needed, therefore, is a new Internet classified ad system and method that allows all classified ads of a given type on the entire World Wide Web to be searchable through a single search engine with field-by-field precision, that allows anyone with a web page to participate in this worldwide classified ad system without requiring any special advertising or database software on the part of the participant, and for all the data in such classified ads to be accessible to anyone with Web access for the purposes of information gathering and analysis.
E. Related Art: Internet Legal Vehicles
Under the related art, legal relationships between website providers and website users are governed by individual terms of use agreements that vary from website to website such that there are literally millions of different terms of use agreements in effect with respect to the millions of different websites available at the time of this writing. This approach is not ideal in that careful reading of each individual website's terms of use agreement is prohibitively time-consuming for a user of multiple websites, and the duplicative legal work associated with the creation of each individual terms of use agreement is wasteful. Meanwhile, resolution of disputes arising under seemingly infinite varieties of terms of use agreements leads to unpredictability in the case law.
Uniform codes (e.g., Uniform Commercial Code or “UCC”) are known and have been effective in reducing interjurisdictional uncertainty. These uniform codes suggest standards for lawmaking bodies, such as state legislatures, to follow so that businesses operating in multiple states do not have to learn multiple legal systems. Unfortunately, the Internet, replete with millions of separately owned and operated private websites, has no such uniformity. Each website is essentially its own little fiefdom.
What is needed, therefore, is a system and method whereby uniformity in terms of use agreements can be advanced so as to allow greater efficiency and reliability for both website providers and website users.
Moreover, numerous contracts that are paper-based under the related art are extremely duplicative as well. Many common agreements, such as purchase or rental agreements, contain large numbers of very similar terms which vary slightly from one agreement to another, which situation again requires excessive legal review by the parties themselves as well as third parties such as consumer advocacy groups and the courts, and again thwarts predictability in the law. Meanwhile, millions of pieces of paper and millions of dollars are unnecessarily spent each year in the creation, documentation, and storage of these terms in contract form.
What is needed, therefore, is a system and method whereby essentially duplicative portions of contracts can be standardized and recorded more efficiently.
Even in situations where the law is well-settled, however, dispute resolution through the courts typically takes anywhere from several months to several years, as backlogs continue to grow. Alternative dispute resolution methods, such as arbitration (e.g., American Arbitration Association), mediation, and religious courts such as the Jewish Beis Din court system, are known and are preferred by many businesses, organizations, and individuals, since protracted legal battles are expensive and time-consuming, and for many litigants the adage “justice delayed is justice denied” holds true. These alternative dispute resolution methods, however, are still only employed in a fraction of cases, since arrangement for such proceedings is done on a case-by-case or contract-by-contract basis. Moreover, many unsophisticated parties have little or no knowledge of the benefits and availability of alternative dispute resolution methods.
What is needed, therefore, is a system and method whereby the benefits of alternative dispute resolution may be made available to and more readily accessed by a larger portion of the population.
F. Related Art: HTML, Order Forms, and Contact Forms
Under the related art, contacting the provider of a website through the website itself relies upon a Web contact submission form (e.g., “<FORM ACTION= . . . ”>) or purchase form. This approach is not ideal in that, since each website is designed completely differently from the next, a Web visitor must learn to navigate through the peculiar layout of each individual website in order to find the given site's order form or contact submission form.
Moreover, the Web order form concept itself is less than ideal in that, every time a user begins purchasing from a vendor through its website, the user must register with this vendor, providing credit card information, e-mail account address, and other sensitive data. Each time this data is circulated to a new party, the user's exposure to the risk of identity theft, fraud, and spam increases. Ideally, Internet users would be able to purchase from website providing vendors without having to register separately with each vendor and to fill out a separate purchase order form for each individual vendor website.
What is needed therefore is a superior communication system and method that allows users to interact with and purchase from all website providers through a single common interface, thus requiring no website navigation, no per-site registration, and no per-purchase order form submission.
Meanwhile, HTML itself is simply a language for defining the structure of a document, such as which part of the document is a title, which part is a paragraph, which part should be emphasized, and so on. HTML is silent about what the document actually says, i.e., HTML does nothing to tell us about the content or subject matter of a given paragraph, sentence, or phrase. Given this reality, under the related art, elaborate content analysis software has been developed, such as that of Applied Semantics, to “read” web pages in an attempt to ascertain the subject matter thereof without human participation. Such an approach is, at best, approximate. Thus, World Wide Web search engines, relying upon highly uncertain approximations, oftentimes return results that are highly variable in terms of relevancy. Ideally, the World Wide Web would be searchable with the field-by-field precision commonly seen in bookkeeping software applications or contact management software, in which programs users can easily search for a particular term, such as a last name, in a particular field, such as a last name field.
What is needed, therefore, is a method of constructing and parsing a web page so that the exact meaning and content thereof can be immediately and reliability ascertained and so that a group of web pages can be searched with field-by-field granularity.
G. Related Art: Internet Search Engine Methodology
Also, under the related art, one commercially successful methodology for searching and ranking the relevancy of web pages is that of citation ranking, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 6,285,999 to Page. This method ranks pages in part according to the number and nature of other Web pages that link to the given page. This method is not ideal in that it provides no means whatsoever for capturing the difference between a “positive” reference and a “negative” reference. In other words, under this method, a link from an article that ridicules the linked document counts just as much as a link from an article that praises the same document.
What is needed, therefore, is a ranking methodology based upon the actual opinions of the user community rather than upon hit-or-miss surrogates for these opinions.
H. Related Art: Internet Dictionary, Stylebook and Grammar Book Technology
Dictionaries, literary stylebooks, and grammar books have heretofore been the province of elite editors and academicians at publishing companies and universities. Language, however, evolves faster than such institutions. In order to speed up the pace at which such reference materials are updated, some attempts have been made to create limited-function, on-line dictionaries—such as dictionaries for computer terms—that allow user-submission of definitions, but these attempts are not ideal in that these dictionaries must still be edited by someone so that false or frivolous submissions do not get published. Such attempts, in the absence of a superior approach, would be even more futile in the more subtle areas of language, such as grammar and style.
One approach is that used in Wikipedia, an online “encyclopedia,” in which all the content is user-created and user-maintained. While the apparent democracy of such an approach seems attractive at first blush, the actual performance of such an approach is disappointing: a novice in a field can delete the work of an eminent scholar in the same field and replace this work with nonsense. Endless retaliatory deletions, re-writings, and political squabbles ensue. Meanwhile, someone trying to use the Wikipedia as a reference tool does so at his or her own risk, since the content thereof may or may not be accurate at and any given time and changes from day to day.
What is needed, therefore, is an effective and efficient means by which a dictionary, stylebook, grammar book or other reference material can be created, maintained, and used as an authoritative reference tool by anyone with Internet access without the need for content-editing institutions.
I. Related Art: Web Browser Toolbar Technology
Software commonly called “toolbars”, such as the NetZero, AOL, and Yahoo Companion toolbars, whereby features are included in or added to a Web browser, such as Microsoft Internet Explorer, are known. These toolbars typically feature advertisements or convenient access to a certain function, such as a Web search engine, that the given toolbar provider wishes to offer users.
One noteworthy variation on this theme is a toolbar feature used by Gain.com, which displays advertisements based upon a user's browsing habits, such as the websites he or she visits. This approach to the toolbar is not ideal in that the toolbar essentially exists to generate ad revenue for the toolbar maker at the expense of website providers themselves. In fact, as alleged in a recent lawsuit, this toolbar mechanism may be used to display ads for competitors of the website provider whose website is being browsed. Ideally, instead of working against website providers, the toolbar would actively serve the purposes of both website providers and visitors—without requiring each individual website provider to build and distribute its own toolbar.
What is needed, therefore, is an effective and efficient means through which the toolbar serves to enable easy, direct interaction between the toolbar user and virtually any provider of a website being browsed.
J. Related Art: Additional Technologies
Computers—which term is meant to include for purposes of this document all manner of computer and telecommunication hardware and software, including CPUs, RAM, ROM, disk drives, removable data storage media, ports, cables, routers, switches, interface devices, keyboards, point-and-click devices, wireless transmission/reception hardware, audio and video display monitors, modems, cards, power supplies, networks, networking equipment, operating systems, etc. —are known. Software comprising instructions stored on digital media whereby information is processed and steps are performed is known. Protocols for the storage and retrieval, both locally and remotely, of information using electronic devices are known. A URL (Uniform Resource Locator), a URI (Uniform Resource Identifier), a file name and a file path are known.
Markup languages (e.g., SGML, HTML, XML) and methods for accessing and manipulating markup language documents (e.g., DOM, SAX) are known, as are methods for displaying information in such documents (e.g., Web browsers, CSS, XSLT) and identifying individual vocabularies used therein (e.g., Namespaces). Database management systems (e.g., Oracle, Sybase), database query languages (e.g., SQL) and means of dynamically generating web pages which incorporate material drawn from a database (e.g., ASP, PHP) are also known. Techniques and software for mapping data from one type of database to another are known. Internet bonding and instantaneous electronic payment systems (e.g., U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/848,639 by Harrison) are known.
Instant messaging services, such as AOL Instant Messenger, whereby a real-time or near real-time data connection is established between an Internet user and the service operator so that real-time delivery of text exchanges between users can be affected, are known.
Public recordation of information such that said information is assigned, indexed, and can be retrieved by a unique alphanumeric identifier, such as copyright registration, is known. Techniques for encoding data on paper for machine retrieval, such as bar codes and high-density bar codes (2D), are known. Means for hosting an image file and updating this image file each time the data in a database field is changed (e.g., Web Page hit counters) are known.
Third-party-beneficiary contracts are known. A “third-party-beneficiary contract” is “a contract between two or more parties, the performance of which is intended to benefit directly a third party [“one not a party to an agreement”], thus giving the third party a right to file suit for breach of contract by either of the original contract parties.” Black's Law Dictionary, 6th edition, page 1480 (West publishing Co., St. Paul, Minn., 1990).